My Name is Paul H Cosentino. I started this Blog in 2011 because of what I believe to be wrongdoings in town government. This Blog is to keep the citizens of Templeton informed. It is also for the citizens of Templeton to post their comments and concerns.

Wednesday, December 21, 2016

Winter Solstice

First day of Winter:

everything you need to know about today's Solstice

What exactly is the winter solstice?

The December solstice happens at
the same instant for all of us, everywhere on Earth. This year the
solstice occurs on Wednesday December 21st at 10:44 GMT (Universal
time).

The winter solstice happens every year when the Sun reaches its most
southerly declination of -23.5 degrees. In other words, when the North
Pole is tilted farthest – 23.5 degrees – away from the Sun, delivering
the fewest hours of sunlight of the year.

The Sun is directly overhead of
the Tropic of Capricorn in the Southern Hemisphere during the December
solstice and is closer to the horizon than at any other time in the
year, meaning shorter days and longer nights.

The shortest day of the year lasts for 7 hours 49 minutes and 41
seconds in Britain. This day is 8 hours, 49 minutes shorter than on June
Solstice. As such, Tuesday December 20th was the longest night of the
year with the sun not rising until 08:04 GMT on Wednesday morning.

The day after the winter solstice marks the beginning of lengthening days, leading up to the summer solstice in June.

In the Southern Hemisphere, the opposite is true. Dawn comes early,
and dusk comes late. The sun is high and the shortest noontime shadow of
the year happens there. In the Southern Hemisphere, people will
experience their longest day and shortest night.

Does the winter solstice always occur on December 21st?

While it more often than not falls on December 21st, the exact time of the solstice varies each year.

Sunrise between the stones at Stonehenge on the Winter Solstice in 1985Credit:
Mark Grant

In the Northern hemisphere the
winter solstice is the shortest day of the year, because it is tilted
away from the sun, and receives the least amount of sunlight on that
day.

However, the earliest sunset does not occur on the solstice, because
of the slight discrepancy between 'solar time' and the clocks we use.

The shortest day of the year often falls on December 21st, but the
modern calendar of 365 days a year - with an extra day every four years -
does not correspond exactly to the solar year of 365.2422 days.
The solstice can happen on December 20, 21, 22 or 23, though December 20 or 23 solstices are rare.
The last December 23 solstice was in 1903 and will not happen again until 2303.

Is it actually the first day of winter?

People gather at Stonehenge in Wiltshire on the winter solstice to witness the sunrise on the shortest day of the yearCredit:
Ben Birchall/PA

The answer might vary depending on who you ask. There are two types of winter: astronomical and meteorological.

Astronomical winter typically begins on December 21st, with the
winter solstice, and ends on March 19th. Meteorological winter always
begins on December 1st and ends on February 28th (February 29th during
leap years).

While astronomical winters are determined by the Earth's orbit around
the sun, meteorological winters are the three calendar months with the
lowest average temperatures.
The Met Office tend to use the meteorological definition of the seasons.

Why do people descend on Stonehenge for the winter solstice?

Stonehenge,
the prehistoric monument located in Wiltshire, is carefully aligned on a
sight-line that points to the winter solstice sunset (opposed to New
Grange, which points to the winter solstice sunrise, and the Goseck
circle, which is aligned to both the sunset and sunrise).
Archaeologists believe it was constructed from 3000 BC to 2000 BC and
it is thought that the winter solstice was actually more important to
the people who constructed Stonehenge than the Summer solstice.
The winter solstice was a time when cattle was slaughtered (so the
animals would not have to be fed during the winter) and the majority of
wine and beer was finally fermented.

Watch | Thousands visit Stonehenge for winter solstice
01:10

The only other megalithic
monuments in the British Isles which clearly align with the sun are
Newgrange in County Meath, Ireland and Maeshowe situated on Mainland,
Orkney, Scotland.
Both famously face the winter solstice sunrise.

To celebrate the solstice and the longest night of the year, people began descending on Stonehenge late on Tuesday night.

Keep up, Druids...

In 2009, a crowd wearing
traditional costume, met at Stonehenge on December 21st morning to mark
the rising of the sun on the shortest day of the year.
But unfortunately their calculations were slightly out meaning they had in fact arrived 24 hours prematurely.
The '09 solstice fell at exactly 5.47pm that day, and because the sun
had already set, the official celebrations should have taken place at
sunrise the next day.
English Heritage, who manage the ancient site in Wiltshire, decided
to open the gates anyway and welcome those who had made a
miscalculation.
A spokesman for English Heritage said at the time: "About 300 people
turned up a day early. We took pity on them and opened the stone circle
so they could celebrate anyway. They were a day early but no doubt had a
wonderful time as well.
"People always assume that because the Summer solstice is the June
21st, the winter solstice will be the 21st December. They should always
check because it does change."

Druid leader Arthur Pendragon during the winter solstice at Stonehenge in WiltshireCredit:
PA

Pagan leader Arthur Pendragon said: "It is the most important day of the year for us because it welcomes in the new sun.
"There were hundreds of people there. If we'd celebrated on the 21st
it would have been the right day but the wrong sun – when the whole
point of the occasion is about welcoming in the new sun."

Why isn’t the earliest sunset on the year’s shortest day?

Solar noon - the time midway between sunrise and sunset is when the
sun reaches its highest point for the day, but the exact time of solar
noon, as measured by Earth’s spin, shifts.
A clock ticks off exactly 24 hours from one noon to the next but
actual days – as measured by the spin of the Earth – are rarely exactly
24 hours long.
If the Earth’s spin is measured from one solar noon to the next, then
one finds that around the time of the December solstice, the time
period between consecutive solar noons is actually 30 seconds longer
than 24 hours.
Therefore two weeks before the solstice, for example – the sun
reaches its 'noontime' position at 11:52 a.m. local standard time.
Two weeks later - on the winter solstice – the sun reached that noontime position at 11:59 a.m. - seven minutes later.
The later clock time for solar noon also means a later clock time for sunrise and sunset. The result? Earlier sunsets before the winter solstice and increasingly later sunrises for a few weeks after the winter solstice.
The exact date of earliest sunset varies with latitude but the sequence is always the same.
For the Northern Hemisphere the earliest sunset occurs in early
December and the latest sunrise in happens in early January. This year
earliest sunset was on 13 December and the latest sunrise on 31
December.